{"id":2324,"date":"2011-04-22T19:05:35","date_gmt":"2011-04-22T18:05:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/emilkirkegaard.dk\/en\/?p=2324"},"modified":"2011-04-22T19:05:35","modified_gmt":"2011-04-22T18:05:35","slug":"swartz-on-fuzzy-concepts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emilkirkegaard.dk\/en\/2011\/04\/swartz-on-fuzzy-concepts\/","title":{"rendered":"Swartz on fuzzy concepts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\">&#8220;Trying  to define \u201cclassical music\u201d in a short phrase (or a few sentences) is a  forlorn task.  The very attempt is the product of an outmoded and  insupportable theory of definition.  To cut a long story short, you  might want to have a look at my online essay, \u201cDefinitions,  Dictionaries, and Meanings\u201d, at <a title=\"External link\" rel=\"nofollow external\" href=\"http:\/\/www.sfu.ca\/philosophy\/swartz\/definitions.htm\">http:\/\/www.sfu.ca\/ph&#8230;definitions.htm<\/a> .  As the last half-century of philosophical research in the area  shows, just about everything taught to children in the public schools  about definition (yes, this almost certainly includes <em>you<\/em>) is simply untenable and false.<\/p>\n<p>There is, and can be, no neat definition of \u201cclassical music\u201d any  more than there can be a neat, capsule, definition of such concepts as  \u201ccause\u201d, \u201cjustice\u201d, \u201clemon\u201d [see section 8 and subsections in my  aforementioned essay], \u201cscience\u201d, \u201creligion\u201d, etc. (ETC.!)<\/p>\n<p>If you want to explain to another person what <em>you<\/em> mean by \u201cclassical music\u201d, proceed by offering examples (instances,  exemplars, etc.)  If, in your use of the phrase, you include folk songs,  say so; if you exclude folk songs, say so.  And let it go at that.   Don\u2019t assume that there is any one, more or less, universally  agreed-upon, \u2018correct\u2019 view.  And even if there were, so what?  What, of  import, could possibly hang on such a resolution?  Just simply try your  best to inform others what sub-genres of music you\u2019re keen to discuss  and then get on with it.  I don\u2019t have the book at home in front of me,  but one does well to recall Karl Popper\u2019s admonition (in <em>Conjectures and Refutations<\/em>) to avoid trying to define one\u2019s terms.&#8221; (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.galilean-library.org\/site\/index.php\/topic\/3486-classical-music\/page__p__46791#entry46791\">source<\/a>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;Trying to define \u201cclassical music\u201d in a short phrase (or a few sentences) is a forlorn task. The very attempt is the product of an outmoded and insupportable theory of definition. To cut a long story short, you might want to have a look at my online essay, \u201cDefinitions, Dictionaries, and Meanings\u201d, at http:\/\/www.sfu.ca\/ph&#8230;definitions.htm . [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[1665,1666],"class_list":["post-2324","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-language-philosophy","tag-fuzzy-concept","tag-swartz","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/emilkirkegaard.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2324","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/emilkirkegaard.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/emilkirkegaard.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emilkirkegaard.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emilkirkegaard.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2324"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/emilkirkegaard.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2324\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2326,"href":"https:\/\/emilkirkegaard.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2324\/revisions\/2326"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/emilkirkegaard.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emilkirkegaard.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emilkirkegaard.dk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}